Snow for the Euros.

[ClarkleberryFinn]

As flat and shallow as possible yesterday

[Boissal]

Just got a few pics from my parents who are in Les Contamines showing the damage from the latest monster storm and rain event. The last one is pretty concerning, beware the glide crack monster...
This is the year I should have left the Wasatch and moved back.

[sf]

Great skiing in Grand Montets today.

Anyone of the Chamonix locals think it will be worth going to Brevent/Flegere tomorrow? Or crusty as hell?

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[Buster Highmen]

Big fun raging around Andermatt with subtle plague

[geo039]

Big fun raging around Andermatt with subtle plague

Screw you guys!

[Alkares]

I know this is a "WRONG THREAD JONG" question, but does anyone here know where I can find a boot fitter/seller for Tecnica boots near Zürich? The pivot screws othe right side of my right boot fell out the other day and now Im having a hell of a time finding replacements. Can anyone send me in the right direction? Thanks!

[geo039]

I know this is a "WRONG THREAD JONG" question, but does anyone here know where I can find a boot fitter/seller for Tecnica boots near Zürich? The pivot screws othe right side of my right boot fell out the other day and now Im having a hell of a time finding replacements. Can anyone send me in the right direction? Thanks!

Migros do it yourself

[Buster Highmen]

Screw you guys!

The Laub in knee deep with Paxti wasn't too shabby either.

[subtle plague]

Yeah it was good fun.. Cheers from the bedretto

[Buster Highmen]

bedwetto? see here: https://www.tetongravity.com/forums/...-Euroroll-2018

[Rossymcg]

any Poland mags in the house?
my missis is a sausage roll, her home towns not far from Zakopane. we're going out there in Feb to hook up with her parents. Zakopane is a really lovely place but I'm after skiing info. last year I was gimped up and was happy to watch my daughter learning to ski at the ski school on the nursery slope. this year I ain't gimped and fancy a bit of sliding

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[Scottish_Skier]

I know this is a "WRONG THREAD JONG" question, but does anyone here know where I can find a boot fitter/seller for Tecnica boots near Zürich? The pivot screws othe right side of my right boot fell out the other day and now Im having a hell of a time finding replacements. Can anyone send me in the right direction? Thanks!

Oh fuck.
That happened to me at least once.

Not cool : great boots but those pivots are infamous for falling out.
Best to add some loctite / glue.

If you cant find a local dealer I am near certain I have one in a drawer at home.
More than happy to earn some karma and post it to CH for you.
Drop me a PM.

[ArchieD]

Sad news being reported in the UK media - two British skiers in Cham have apparently fallen to their deaths. Seems like they were skiing couloir du chapeau, and slipped and fell a long way. Another skier with them raised the alarm. I don't know that route, but assume it has some exposure somewhere. Police noted the conditions weren't good.

Thoughts are with their family and friends. RIP.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-...veral-11930194

[peds]

I don't know that route, but assume it has some exposure somewhere. Police noted the conditions weren't good.

Very sad news indeed.
Apparently they were two holidaymakers, a 25 and a 30 year old. Conditions would most certainly not have been good in it yesterday, being relatively low and south facing it was heavily freeze-thawed, with other people's tracks rutting it out from previous descents, and almost certainly a polished slide path lower down in the couloir with bare ice and rocks.




Plainly visible from town center. A few hundred meters long, mostly 35 degrees, never more than 40, a couple of icy choke points halfway down. It is necessary to traverse skiers left onto a summer walking trail because the couloir finishes out over this cliff:

[Scottish_Skier]

Sad news.
We have all likely been on an icy / exposed slope that turned out to be a bad idea at some point.
Not just avalanches that can be deadly.

FWIW : I see at least a couple of people who post on this forum in the photo borrowed above.
Obviously a different day and independent of yesterdays events.

[peds]

We have all likely been on an icy / exposed slope that turned out to be a bad idea at some point.

We sure have, just yesterday afternoon I had to be helicoptered out from near the end of a disintegrating exit couloir after what turned out to be a pretty shitty choice of route. Live, thankfully, and learn.

FWIW : I see at least a couple of people who post on this forum in the photo borrowed above.
Obviously a different day and independent of yesterdays events.

Yes yes, quite right, those are just taking from a trawl through google images. Two shots are from LC's blog a few years ago. It was a good idea to point that out, cheers.

[Rossymcg]

We sure have, just yesterday afternoon I had to be helicoptered out from near the end of a disintegrating exit couloir after what turned out to be a pretty shitty choice of route. Live, thankfully, and learn.




Yes yes, quite right, those are just taking from a trawl through google images. Two shots are from LC's blog a few years ago. It was a good idea to point that out, cheers.

how much did that cost for the helli evac?

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[peds]

Seeing as I was quite firmly outside the "domaine skiable", it should be free, as the costs are covered by the nation and not the commune. It is something of a grey area, unfortunately.

[hafjell]

Seeing as I was quite firmly outside the "domaine skiable", it should be free, as the costs are covered by the nation and not the commune. It is something of a grey area, unfortunately.

1. Could you have hiked up and out of the couloir?
2. How did you contact the rescue team?
3. Did they fly you out in the helicopter or were you suspended on a sled a la world cup racers?
Crazy experience. Very glad you're ok.

[peds]

1. Could you have hiked up and out of the couloir?
2. How did you contact the rescue team?
3. Did they fly you out in the helicopter or were you suspended on a sled a la world cup racers?
Crazy experience. Very glad you're ok.

Thanks.
I'm going to try and type something up over the next few days, partly just to order everything for myself, but just briefly...

I couldn't really have climbed back out, I had skied one of a whole bunch of couloirs that funnel down into this single exit couloir. Only when I was about a third of the way into the exit couloir did I find out that it had slid out overnight, after I had eyes on it at around sundown the previous evening, and the nice level cone at the bottom of my line, pure white and skiable when I'd seen it through binoculars from the other side of the valley yesterday afternoon, was splayed out in a messy debris pile a hundred metres long, and the guts of the couloir were scraped bare. I had aimed to ski the top couloir in sun-softened spring snow, and needed the lower couloir to be clean skiing to get out of the way in time before the upper couloirs and faces all started sluffing stuff off.
So, I had already lost a hell of a lot of time sidestepping down with my axe out, over ice, bare rocks, polished slide runnels, etc... and I decided to switch to crampons and start downclimbing, which was a lot quicker, but then a few minutes later I decided that I quite literally didn't have time for this, so I climbed sideways out of the couloir and onto a small rocky buttress below a cliff, overlooking the couloir. I knew from photomaps that I'd taken of the area over the years that it gave access to an alternative descent slope on the edge of a moraine, but unfortunately I found that the bottom of this crumbling moraine was already shitting rocks away in the heat of the day. Just a few minutes later, whilst I was looking around at my options, I heard the unmistakable hissing noise over my left shoulder, which grew to a loud roar as the first avalanche tore down the bottom of the couloir. I had brought up the idea of calling a helicopter in my mind about fifteen minutes earlier, and that made the final decision for me.

I anchored myself to a handy flake of rock that I'd stopped next to, took my phone off airplane mode, and phoned my wife to check in (I was already late home by this point) ask her to contact mountain rescue, as I didn't know how much battery I had left. They phoned me back a few minutes later and got a more detailed location from me, asked if I was in any immediate danger and anchored safely, and told me that I was in the queue. They phoned back another ten minutes later and asked, because there were other more serious cases going on ("You are sure you are in total security?"), if I minded hanging on for a while as they took care of business. I'm not sure about the timings of the Chapeau Couloir tragedy, but I assume they were managing that episode whilst I waited. So I sat for the next two and a half hours watching slide after slide rip down my exit couloir thirty metres to my left, and the moraine wall crumble away in machinegun fire beneath me. Fun times!
Eventually, the chopper arrived, the pilot phoned me and asked me to guide them towards my location, they spotted me, a dude lowered out the side of the chopper on a winch, clipped to my harness, I grabbed my sling off of the rock anchor and away we flew. They dropped me off at the Grands Montets ski area.

[subtle plague]

Sounds like fun. btw. Aren't you in an alpine club? German Austrian and Swiss clubs s include rescue in Europe. I thought that was the case everywhere?

[subtle plague]

And I guess you can become a member of any club where you live. Regardless of nationality. I don't know about Zhe French though...

[peds]

Yeah of course, I'm with CAF. But mountain rescues outside of ski resorts are still free, so the legend goes. The actual definition of the area of a ski resort is a bit hazy, and has been a point of some contention in the past.

[Scottish_Skier]

Yeah of course, I'm with CAF. But mountain rescues outside of ski resorts are still free, so the legend goes. The actual definition of the area of a ski resort is a bit hazy, and has been a point of some contention in the past.

in theory French mountaineering rescues are free but off piste skiing should be covered by carte neige (which you buy with lift pass). so the status for Aiguille du Midi is theoretically different for Grand Montets. how it works in reality I am not sure,

interesting and honest write up : glad no harm done beyond dented pride and a slagging in pub.
sounds like you made correct call once in a nasty situation.
fwiw : my only experience of heli-skiing was also similarly humbling experience.

[geo039]

Thanks.
I'm going to try and type something up over the next few days, partly just to order everything for myself, but just briefly...

I couldn't really have climbed back out, I had skied one of a whole bunch of couloirs that funnel down into this single exit couloir. Only when I was about a third of the way into the exit couloir did I find out that it had slid out overnight, after I had eyes on it at around sundown the previous evening, and the nice level cone at the bottom of my line, pure white and skiable when I'd seen it through binoculars from the other side of the valley yesterday afternoon, was splayed out in a messy debris pile a hundred metres long, and the guts of the couloir were scraped bare. I had aimed to ski the top couloir in sun-softened spring snow, and needed the lower couloir to be clean skiing to get out of the way in time before the upper couloirs and faces all started sluffing stuff off.
So, I had already lost a hell of a lot of time sidestepping down with my axe out, over ice, bare rocks, polished slide runnels, etc... and I decided to switch to crampons and start downclimbing, which was a lot quicker, but then a few minutes later I decided that I quite literally didn't have time for this, so I climbed sideways out of the couloir and onto a small rocky buttress below a cliff, overlooking the couloir. I knew from photomaps that I'd taken of the area over the years that it gave access to an alternative descent slope on the edge of a moraine, but unfortunately I found that the bottom of this crumbling moraine was already shitting rocks away in the heat of the day. Just a few minutes later, whilst I was looking around at my options, I heard the unmistakable hissing noise over my left shoulder, which grew to a loud roar as the first avalanche tore down the bottom of the couloir. I had brought up the idea of calling a helicopter in my mind about fifteen minutes earlier, and that made the final decision for me.

I anchored myself to a handy flake of rock that I'd stopped next to, took my phone off airplane mode, and phoned my wife to check in (I was already late home by this point) ask her to contact mountain rescue, as I didn't know how much battery I had left. They phoned me back a few minutes later and got a more detailed location from me, asked if I was in any immediate danger and anchored safely, and told me that I was in the queue. They phoned back another ten minutes later and asked, because there were other more serious cases going on ("You are sure you are in total security?"), if I minded hanging on for a while as they took care of business. I'm not sure about the timings of the Chapeau Couloir tragedy, but I assume they were managing that episode whilst I waited. So I sat for the next two and a half hours watching slide after slide rip down my exit couloir thirty metres to my left, and the moraine wall crumble away in machinegun fire beneath me. Fun times!
Eventually, the chopper arrived, the pilot phoned me and asked me to guide them towards my location, they spotted me, a dude lowered out the side of the chopper on a winch, clipped to my harness, I grabbed my sling off of the rock anchor and away we flew. They dropped me off at the Grands Montets ski area.

And again this proves this is the best thread on TGR. Good to hear you are ok Peds